Threat #4: Stealing your inbox

Do we like giving out our email addresses?

No, because we don’t like spam.

Do we like risking our email accounts being stolen?

No, but how do you protect your email and use it?

Let’s talk about a service you never knew you desperately needed.

Updated 220629

Understanding the problem:

Everybody wants your email address.  Every website service, every merchant you order from, every doctor, every utility .  But what do they do with your address?  Some sell your address, some have your information stolen by spammers, some spam you themselves.  When (not if) your information is stolen, hackers will try to use that stolen password to try to get into your email account and take it over so they can reset the password on your other accounts and take them over (e.g. bank, social media, etc.).

This seems insoluble, doesn’t it?  How do you give out your email address without allowing people to know your email address?

What are your options?

You could:

• Do without the product – If the product is free you are the product.  Also, do we really need more?  I owned a house built in the 40’s.  To the original owners the closets were normal.  To us they seemed half size.
• Use “real” and “throwaway” email addresses for different kinds of email.  Then you have to check both addresses and remember which is which.  Buying from Lands End is more real than a photography tips newsletter, but neither is as real as my bank, so which do I use?
• Learn to live with spam.  Gmail and other big services are good about stepping on spam.  They are sometimes overactive but my provider protects me from most spam.  But the longer my email address is out there, the more spam I get.

Is there a better solution?

Yes, use an anonymous email forwarding service.  This allows you to give out alias email addresses instead of your real one.  Messages to your alias arrive in your regular email inbox.  Everyone who needs to contact you can have a different email alias that goes to you.

• Fast:  Just read your primary email account instead of having to maintain two or more accounts.
• Private: Reply without giving away your real email address – unlike a free alias.
• Secure:  Hide your real email address so your alias can’t be used for credential stuffing, an automated attempt to try one stolen password of yours everywhere.
• Antispam:  With one click you can delete an alias if it gets spam.
• Future Proofing:  Without email forwarding, if you change your email provider you’ll have to update dozens and dozens of places that have the old one.  With email forwarding you change your aliases in one place.

How would you use this?

• You buy a domain or use a subdomain, This should be anything short and memorable not already taken by someone else.
  • When asked for an email address you can make one up and it works with no additional setup.
    • Example:  register for Mike’s Camera newsletters with:   mikescamera@ironbutterfly.com.
    • Example:  get a tantalizing guide on “How to take better outdoor photos” from the SpiffyPics website  with spiffypics@ironbutterfly.com.
  • If someone starts spamming you, just get rid of that alias.
    • Example:  If I started getting spam on flybynightguy@ironbutterfly.com I would one click delete the alias(from the email itself!).  This doesn’t affect any of my other aliases.  If I want to stay in touch with the company with the spammed alias, I’ll give them a new alias to use.
  • Subdomain Example:  If you choose “ironbutterfly” now any name@ironbutterfly.33mail.com goes to your regular email.
  • Domain Example:  If you buy the domain ironbutterfly.com and configure per instructions then any name@ironbutterfly.com goes to your regular email.  This is safer than than a free subdomain because I can change email alias services and still use the same aliases.  The email addresses are also shorter.  It’s also less obvious you’re using anonymous forwarding.

Multiple good options:

• Free tier – AnonAddy or SimpleLogin depending on how you use it (e.g. do you need anonymous replies and better bandwidth).
• Middle tier – AnonAddy wins
• Higher tier – SimpleLogin wins by a wide margin

I’ve used all 3 of these providers and they’re all good.

Details:

Tiers	Free			Middle		Higher
Item	SimpleLogin	AnonAddy	33Mail	AnonAddy	33Mail	SimpleLogin	AnonAddy	33Mail
Service level	Free	Free	Lite	Lite	Premium	Premium	Pro	Pro
Cost	free	free	free	$12/year	$12/year	$30/year	$36/year	$60/year
Aliases	15	unlimited	unlimited	unlimited	unlimited	unlimited	unlimited	unlimited
Anonymous replies/day	unlimited	none	none	20	20	unlimited	100	100
Monthly Bandwidth	unlimited	10 MB	10 MB	50 MB	50 MB	unlimited	unlimited	500 MB
Custom domains	none	none	none	1	1	unlimited	20	5
Real email destinations	1	2	1	5	2	unlimited	30	6
Multiple users				+1			+10
Alias subdomains	none	1	1	2	+3	50	3	6
Shared domain aliases	none	20	none?	50		none	unlimited
Reverse Aliases	yes	no	yes	no	no	yes	no	no
Browser Extensions	Chrome, Firefox, Safari	no	yes	no	no	Chrome, Firefox, Safari	no	no
Ads	no	no	yes	no	no	no	no	no

Features:

Service level	Vendors don’t use the same terminology but all have 3 tiers
Cost	per year
Aliases	I feel much more comfortable with unlimited.
Anonymous replies/day	The 20 reply limit would be pretty easy to hit.
Monthly Bandwidth	Newsletters use this up quickly.  I want 50 MB+.
Custom domains	For me this is a must have.  It costs $12-60/year and some 1 time setup but gives portability.
Real email destinations	A husband and wife could either buy more than one of these or buy their own service and domains.
Multiple users	Not a big deal to me but could be for a large organization.
Alias subdomains	I don’t think subdomains are nearly as good as domains.
Shared domain aliases	Interesting but, again, your own domain is portable and these aren’t.
Reverse Aliases	A regular alias conversation starts when someone contacts you on your alias.  This allows you to start the conversation but still keep your real email secret.
Browser Extensions	Browser based assist in creating aliases. Not a biggie.
Ads	Ugh. Who wants ads?

Credit where credit is due:

Thanks to crazy man, Michael Bazzell for recommending these services.  He’s not tinfoil hat crazy, he’s solve every security problem crazy and that is very, very useful for the rest of us.  Here’s his take on email forwarding services.